I, like yourselves, have never been able to restrain myself when it comes to campaigns. When I was younger my mates and I would be playing a game and all of a sudden we'd think of new theme based objectives and alternative follow up games depending on the thematic resolution of what we were currently playing.

One of my favourites was a kill team game where the Kill Team was lead by Chuck Norris and their objective was to assasinate John Howard (the Current Australian Prime minister)

But ANYWAY,

One thing most campaigns have never had are RESOURCES. For anyone who's played any Real Time Strategy Computer games or some boardgames, Resource Management can be as crucial to winning a 'war' as fielding quality or troops (Or even more so) So to add a new level of complexity (And we need more of that the way GW is designing everything for 12 yo) My latest Campaign is going to be a resource based crusade.

So first off the Campaign.

The Game System we are using is Lord of the Rings Strategy Battle Game. Now don't groan, we have our reasons. Primarily because it is awsome. But I'm sure some of you will be deluded enough to disagree with me, so I have more. I love lotr and I've been itching to make certain terrain pieces (where my heart truly lies) so the campaign will take place within this new terrain. Also no other gaming system can truly capture such a narrative feel as lotr.

There are two sides to this war; good and evil. With a primary focus on the age old conflict; Gondor and Morder, with other races coming in as allies. The Campaign 'Map' as it were is to take place in the City of Osgiliath.

So the Resources. We have kept it simple and gone Dawn of War Style and having only one major Resource. In this case Gold instead of Requisition. but it essentially has the same theme.

Gold is accrued in a variety of ways within the Game Turn, and is then used in the Campaign turn (sometimes in game as well) to perform a variety of functions.

Gold is used for a few main things;

Purchasing New Troops for reinforcement.Paying the upkeep cost on your existing troops.Purchasing other items such as barricades, ships, war machines etc.

The first one is an obvious necessity. If your men die; you need more.The Upkeep cpst however, is something I've always wanted to do in a campaign. This cost must be paid every campaign turn and represnts the gold that would have to be spent on feeding your troops and keeping their weapons and armour in a usable condition. The upkeep various from unit to unit depending on unit type. Cavalry for instance is more expensicve than infantry, but trolls are more expensive again. So if you want to field the big bad boys, you got to make sure they aren't Hungry.

Another thing about upkeep is that you can elect not to feed your troops. These troops will then suffer from certain stat penalties, until eventually they die are on the verge of starvation and in Gondor's case they retreat and count as dead, or in Mordor's case, they stay till they die

So this expenditure is all very well and good, but how do we get our gold?

There are several main ways in which gold is earned;

Killing enemy troops. At the end of each game turn you receive the points worth in gold of the enemy units that you killed.Supply Carts. These are literally horse (or warg) drawn carts that spawn periodically within the game turn in random spots of the city, and must be escorted to your command building. If the cart makes it home you get 100 gold. If the enemy destroys your cart, they get 200 gold.Explore bonuses. Small gold bonuses can also be attained through owning terretories in a certain way, which I won't bother outlining here.

So we have gold, and we spend it. Then we push and pull and hopefully Gondor gains Osgiliath

So my question o lads is essentially, what do you think? We have done some small playtesting with the resource system and are pretty comfortable that the gold intake and expenditure should upscale and work.

Another thing about upkeep is that you can elect not to feed your troops. These troops will then suffer from certain stat penalties, until eventually they die are on the verge of starvation and in Gondor's case they retreat and count as dead, or in Mordor's case, they stay till they die

How cruel...

If you elect not to feed, say a Mordor troll, will it's points cost go down in relation to it's stat penalties, so you basically get a cheaper troll that can still bludgeon any pesky Gondorians who get in it's way??

I like the principle. It adds some complexity but sounds like its still simple enough to be eased into.

The only problem that I can see is that if your army gets minced in a battle you are doubly hit... your opponent gets lots of gold, whilst you are left having to buy new troops! Perhaps a way around this is that you roll a dice for each chap at the end of the battle and on a particular roll they die for good. This way its not necessarily the end of the world if you lose the fight... you'll still need to pay for upkeep etc, but hopefully won'tbe left with no one to fight for you.

You could link this to a stat... so, for instance, the model has to pass a Toughness test or a Courage test (though this would disadvantage evil guys) as a representation of the medical attention they would receive. That way you can rationalise replacing a dead model as paying gold for the best medical attention you can buy... and so characters etc. can be given names and personalities and not risk being decapitated out of the campaign!

As and when you might want to add more complexity you could look to the necromunda rules or mordheim rules. There are things in there that you will be able to apply to your heroes... i wouldn't recommend using the system across the whole board as things might get overly confusing and convoluted, but it might be nice to see your heroes change and evolve throughout the campaign as a result of the fighting.

We have thought about this and have a few measures in place. The Supply Carts ensure that there is always some gold generated so even though the opposition has won a score of gold, if the battle was gone ill you aren't totally pennyless. Also, fluctuations of income are only really going to be a massive problem in the initial phases of the campaign before each side has a solid base established. So to counter this each team starts with a small amount of gold to help them get on their feet.

In relation to re-buying heroes, we are simply presuming that they don't die, they simply become to incapacited/injured to continue fighting, so they retreat to get medial aid and must be repurchased. Heroes also have a slightly different upkeep system. They have their standard unit cost depending upon their unit type (infantry, cavalry, etc) but there replenishable stats like wounds, or might will and fate, must also be paid for, each being 5 gold in addition to their upkeep. These do not have to be paid, you can keep your hero weak if you choose.

Now the other point is discuss is that if what you say occurs, then your opponent must be careful. They may use the opportunity to buy a massive amount of troops, but they will eventually have to pay the upkeep for them. This is another benefit of the upkeep, It keeps the two generals not spending ridiculously, because they must support the troops the take.

Now after my stalwart defence of our system, I will admit that it has been a bit of a conceptual struggle not to do exactly as you have said O!nk and have an injury table for units or something similar so that maybe not all of them die, but to be honest in the interest of keeping the game streamlined we opted to just let them die. Tt saves a whole heap of effort in the campaign turn, (which is clagged enough with troop re-allocations) and actually allows someone to eventually win. If one side charges over the river and begins to own, but everytime they kill an enemy army, its back at 50%-75% next game turn anyway, there will never be a clear victor. As the attacking team won't be able to keep up the assault as their reinforcements have a great distance to travel.

So essentially to prevent massacre players will have to play with a combination of attack and defence. However the last thing we want is each side of the Anduin Turtling with thousands of troops. It's all really a fine balance isn't it? Hmmm.

In response to your suggestion of generating some personality within the army, we absolutely agree. What hasn't been outlined here is that when the game begins the very first 750pt army you begin with become known as your 'originals'. Over the course of the campaign these units are kept track of (if they survive ) and begin to gain stat bonuses due to their experience. And possibly even get named etc etc. Should be really cool getting attached to units

Holy beslubber I'm so Sorry O!nk. You just post such stimulating questions

I respond here instead of the Forge since this thread contains more info about the campaign.

From the look of it it does sound like a very decent system that ought to work quite well. There might be some imbalance after a few campaign turns but that would be realistic as one of the forces become more damaged than the other while still leaving some room for the underdog to return and put up a fight. A lot of the pieces will probably fall into place when the campaign actually starts, both problems and solutions.